Category: Faith & Hope

Best Fast Food Ever – VegHeads Drive Thru

Normally going to a fast food restaurant is not an option for my family.  There really are days though that I would just love to be able to go to a drive thru for a quick meal that I don’t have to cook.  I found the perfect place in Asheville, NC.  It is VegHeads Drive Thru.  The food was amazing and the prices were reasonable.  It is probably good that we live over and hour away or I amy go there more than I should.

VegHeads drive thru 1

This is the mountain Burger that my husband had.  It was delicious!  He had seaweed cucumber salad on the side.  Kind of a weird combo, but he was happy.

 

drive thru

My daughter has the mini mountain burger from the kids menu.  It was really cute.

VegHeads Drive Thru 3

I had a baked falafel wrap, which was unbelievable, with tabbouleh on the side.  The falafel was baked instead of fried, so it wasn’t greasy at all.

VegHeads Drive Thru 4

This is the Veggie Stack that my Mom had.  It is not actually vegan because of the feta cheese and the bread, but my Mom said it was delicious.

 

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Celebrate Earth Day

earth day

Earth Day is April 22nd and it is a great time to think about ways we can be kind to our planet.  My kids decided that they want to pick up all the trash around our house for Earth Day.  Even though we live in the mountains, there is an unbelievable amount of trash left on the roads near our home.   Here are a few things that you can do on a daily basis to help conserve our resources.

Following a plant based diet makes a huge positive impact on the environment.  Raising livestock creates a lot of pollution and meat production uses a huge amount of water.  It takes about 2500 gallons of water to produce 1 pound of meat.  Eating plants uses only a fraction of the water.

Recycle what ever you can.  Most of us are really good about recycling our trash, but try to find ways to recycle or upcycle all your unwanted items.  Donate all your old clothes, electronics, sports equipment and other useable household items.  Reuse as much as you can.  Also, try to buy products that contain recycled materials.

Buy used whenever you can.  Buying something used saves resources and saves you a lot of money as well.  There are tons of great consignment shops and thrift stores everywhere now.

All the little things we do each day really add up, so just making small changes makes a big impact and creates hope for our future!

 

 

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Asheville, North Carolina

For our 9th Anniversary my husband and I spent a few days in Asheville.  It is such a beautiful, cool city and super veggie friendly.  There are so many restaurants in Asheville that are all vegetarian and even a few that are totally vegan.  It is so great to be able to order almost anything on the menu instead of having limited choices.  One of our Favorite restaurants is The Laughing Seed, which is where we had dinner.   We also went to Rosetta’s Kitchen and had some not so healthy snacks, which included chili cheese fries.  Breakfast was at the Green Sage where we had some really yummy fresh juice.  Asheville is definitely a city worth visiting and is where I would love to live.  I was so happy to have some time with my husband.  The few years have been so stressful for our family and he has been my rock.  I thank God for him everyday and for the way he leads our family.  We have had some tough times lately, but we have made our marriage and our faith a priority and both have been strengthened.

Here are the pictures of what we ate:

Asheville

Bloody Mary at The Laughing Seed

 

Asheville

This was Mike’s dinner.  It is brown rice risotto with mushrooms, sweet potatoes and tempeh.

 

Asheville

This was my dinner.  It is the Indian plate with vegetable curry, lentils and naan.  It was so spicy and good!

 

Asheville

Coconut Cream pie for dessert!

 

Asheville

This is the Red Planet juice at the Green Sage where we had breakfast.  It is beet, carrot, apple and ginger.  After all the decadent food the night before this was just what I needed.

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Chef Brooke’s

I am finally home from Florida and my Mom is all settled in her new house here in North Carolina.  This last week has been so crazy, but it has been worth it to get my parents close by.  It is such a blessing to have family close to us again.

Before leaving Ft Myers I had to go to my favorite restaurant there, Chef Brooke’s Natural Cafe.  She always has the most beautiful, delicious food and the best vegan cupcakes.   My favorite are the raw nori rolls with sesame dressing.  I order them every time I go.  This time my husband and I shared the coconut mung bean dahl, nori rolls and the tofu platter.  Normally I am not a fan of tofu, but hers was so good.  My kids took a bite and kept begging for more.

Nori Rolls

Tofu Platter

Coconut Dahl

Vegan Cupcakes

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Legends Dinner

 

Last night we had dinner at the Legend’s Country Club in Ft Myers, Fl.  We had called ahead to see if the chef could make a vegan dinner for our family and they were very happy to work with us.  The Chef made us the most delicious dinner.  We had a acorn squash soup for a starter  and  vegetable purses for our main course, which were absolutly wonderful.  For the purses he filled phyllo dough with squash, tomatoes and a great sauce.  I think that should be on the menu all the time.  For dessert we had raspberry sorbet.  The whole dinner was so good and we were very grateful to the chef and the staff for the wonderful experience.

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Florida

Yesterday we came down to Ft Myers, FL to visit family and help my Mom move.  I am not sure how much cooking I will get to do in the next few weeks, but I hopefully be able to do a few posts.  I also get to see my very best friend who has recently become vegetarian.  I am so proud of her. She is a mother of 4 and a full time engineering student.  Despite her super busy schedule she is trying to totally change her diet to improve her health and that of her family.  She is such an inspiration to me.

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Rainy Day Art

Today is another rainy day here.  For homeschool today we decided to make patterns out of leaves.  Super messy, but so much fun!  Since we can’t go outside today, I see baking in my future.

 

 

 

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Day in Knoxville

Today we visited beautiful Knoxville, TN.  My husband had to take a test for a job he applied for, so the kids and I explored downtown and said our prayers for the test to go well.  Our plans were to go to the Mellow Mushroom for lunch which is a rare treat for us.  On the way this happened:

Our radiator blew up.  We were hours from home and had to find a dealership that could do the repair.  Eventually we got it all taken care of and made it home tonight.  We also made it to the Mellow Mushroom for veggie pizza thanks to the very nice people at the dealership.  They drove us there and picked us up while the car was being repaired.  The only bad part, besides the enormous unexpected bill, was we didn’t get to see all the sites.   I was very thankful that the car broke down while we were in the city before we were driving home through the middle of no where, so that was a big blessing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Hello world!

This is my first post on Faith, Hope and Veggies.  I hope to share many vegan recipes here, as well as some of my experiences.  I have been vegan for about 2 years now and have enjoyed it so much.  Being vegan was certainly challenging in the beginning, but now it seems so easy.  I could never go back to how I was eating before.  I feel so much healthier, happier and I know that I am doing the right thing for my family and the planet as well.  I love cooking and baking and I am always thinking about what I am going to make next.  I try to use very little fat and sugar in my recipes, but every once in awhile I splurge.

My family and I have recently moved to small cabin in the beautiful mountains of North Carolina.  Recently, our life has been downsized with due to the economy.  I am now doing all my cooking in a tiny kitchen and with a tiny budget.  I know from experience now that it is possible to eat very healthfully without spending much.  Also, the closest grocery store has very little so I have learned to cook with very basic ingredients that can be found anywhere.  It is an hour drive to the nearest Whole Foods or Earth Fare, so I have to be creative with what I can find.  The farmer’s markets this summer where a God send.  I don’t know what I will do without the markets this winter.

My Faith is very important in my life and I don’t know how I could make it through these difficult times in our lives without it.  It also is part of the reason I am vegan because I believe that all creature deserve our compassion.

So tonight I am making a mini Thanksgiving.  Actually, I am just trying a couple of recipes I may use (it is never to early to start).  I will post pictures of the meal later.

 

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